I Belong to Me
An Intimate Bioscopic Experience with Treadmill Trackstar
email us for a CD or Download of the Album.Click the links above for Free Song and Cool Widget Embed Code. Please don’t link do this page- Please link to http://treadmilltrackstar.com
Hi. We have no naive ambition other than to try to get as many folks as we can to hear our music. We hope that you’ll let us send you a CD and that you’ll judge us on that alone. That being said, we know that sometimes something other than music is needed to grab a bit of attention. So read on if you must!
Treadmill Trackstar is an eclectic alt-noir-pop band that features a cellist and sounds like a concoction that is equal parts Wilco and Smashing Pumpkins, topped off with a dollop of Big Star.
How does a band that got unceremoniously dropped from a major label, has been defunct for ten years, whose members who have violent reactions to touring, and who have no interest in ever revisiting the music business (as if the music business wanted us) pay for a decent recording? Great question. That was our question too. We figured we needed about 6 grand to make even the lowest quality record. And we didn’t even have the cash for that.
So this insane plan was hatched. We’d get our friends and fans and family to contribute Public Radio style. Yeah! We’d raise the money! Brilliant! Um, except our friends were poor, our families don’t talk to us, and our fans are all dead of old age. But I found our dusty old email list. I mean, dusty as hell. Last time I used it was on a Mac Classic. We put together a bunch of dumb contribution levels (Bad Ass, Cool Mo’ Fo’, etc..) and we sent that email to our old list. Just flat out asking for cash. What did we have to lose?
Right away, half the emails were returned as dead addresses. What did we expect? But then, somehow, slowly – cash started appearing in our Paypal account. We were like, holy shit! No way!” Once we got to about six hundred bucks, we’re like, “That’s plenty. Let’s start recording.”
So we did. And the money kept rolling in. And then suddenly we had over Twelve Grand. And before we fainted in disbelief – we spent every single penny making an album that we’re pretty proud of. It’s called, I Belong to Me. And we’d like for people to hear it. Because we’re musicians. And as musicians, we don’t really exist unless someone listens to our music.
**************************
We toured America from 1991 until 1998 in an extremely dangerous and smelly box truck. We released our first record, Excessive Use of the Passive Voice, on a tiny indie label called Raging Rose Records in 1994. That album garnered surprising regional airplay throughout the southeast. Our constant touring came to a climax in the summer of 1997 when we were lucky enough to hit the summer festival circuit with the likes of Beck, Moby and Iggy Pop and had the chance to perform for crowds of thirty thousand plus. (This was the ROAR Tour – anyone remember that?! Oh God.)
We received our ‘lucky break’ in 1997 when we were signed to an Atlantic Records imprint called Breaking. We made a good record called Only This. After a year of typical music industry soul crushing, we got dropped. You’ve heard it all before. We soon realized that the music industry was evil and that we should be grateful to have escaped without any major addictions. So we said, screw it, and went our separate ways in 1998. Families, alternative careers and kids ensued for all of us. Goodbye sweet dream of Rock Stardom. Hello motorcycle messagering.
Fast forward to 2007. I’d just moved back to the East Coast within striking distance of my old bandmates. (This is Angelo here by the way. Thanks for getting this far.) A group of promoters found Tony on MySpace and contacted him out of the blue about getting Treadmill back together to perform at a charity concert. We were like, “why the hell would we want to do that!? We’re old and shitty. No way.” But after much gnashing of teeth, we made it onto the stage. And brother… sister… let me tell you something. It was glorious. Here’s what was different. This time, it was music for music’s sake. Nothing else. No pressure and no expectations and no goals. Perfect! It was, dare I say it… enjoyable again. And that’s when things began to get interesting. What if we could make a record with those same lowly ideals intact? No expectations and no goals. Hmmm…. Interesting…
So, after playing our first show in a decade after hardly keeping in touch, we felt that the natural next step would be to make a record.
**************************
What we’ve learned is that, for us, making music for money is a bad idea that doesn’t result in music we can be completely proud of. So, we are now a not-for-profit style entity whose goal from now on will be to get the next project done.
I’d much rather send you the record then tell you about it. But here’s what I will say. It’s just exactly what we wanted it to be. We’ve had a lot of things happen to us in the past 10 years since our lifelong dreams were dashed. I didn’t play a note for two years after we got dropped because I was so mad at music for letting us down. How stupid. And while we all got on with our lives and had success in other things, there was some unresolved stuff we needed to get out there. And we couldn’t resolve it until we all got back together again. We had to do it together. And this record is it. Resolved. Luckily, we have a whole host of other unresolved stuff for the next record.
Here’s the thing. We don’t want much. We just really want this music to be heard by a few humans. This isn’t a career. We don’t want anything other than to spread our music and maybe do another project. That’s it.
We’d really appreciate it if you could help us. It’s a decent story and it’s a great album that contains everything we’ve got. It’s up to you to decide if everything we’ve got is enough. Hope you’ll give it a listen. email us for a physical CD or a Digital Download.
Cheers,
~Angelo
Angelo Gianni Vocals/Guitars/Keys Tony Lee Drums Heidi Carey Cello/Keys Mike Mills Bass/VocalsEmbed this cool widget in your post!
<object type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” data=”http://widgets.clearspring.com/o/4a37fac83c457251/4b6710f8dc987d59/4b28ef41f91d6e0b/532692a/-cpid/501d1fd580ab262d” id=”W4a37fac83c4572514b6710f8dc987d59″ width=”400″ height=”160″><param name=”movie” value=”http://widgets.clearspring.com/o/4a37fac83c457251/4b6710f8dc987d59/4b28ef41f91d6e0b/532692a/-cpid/501d1fd580ab262d” /><param name=”wmode” value=”transparent” /><param name=”allowNetworking” value=”all” /><param name=”allowScriptAccess” value=”always” /></object>